The present invention relates to a novel blade bracket connector for ceiling fans, and more particularly to a blade bracket connector which releasably connects the fan blade to the rotor.
Ceiling fans are normally connected to a motorized rotor by means of a blade bracket connector, one end of which is secured to the rotor, and the other end of which is attached to a fan blade. Because of the size and bulkiness of ceiling fans, they are delivered from a factory to a customer or to a store, for sale to a customer, in a disassembled form, with the blade brackets secured to the rotor and the fan blades usually disconnected from the blade brackets. The customer must connect each blade to a blade bracket connector by means of screws. This is a laborious and time consuming task.
In order to facilitate the task of mounting the fan blades to the rotor, blade bracket connectors have been developed which are secured at the factory to the blades, but which are shipped disasembled from the rotor to be assembled by the customer by means of a spring lock mechanism associated with the hub on the motor. The added length of the combination of the preassembled blade bracket and fan blade adds significantly to the shipping volume of each fan, increasing that volume by as much as fifteen percent, resulting in increased shipping costs and hence increased price to the consumer of such fans.
Another approach, in order to facilitate customer installation while at the same time attempting to reduce the shipping volume of each fan unit from the factory, has been to hinge the fan blades to the motor hub. The hinged construction of such fans does not provide as great stability as a ceiling fan having a conventional blade bracket construction, and still results in excess shipping volume of the units.
Yet another approach to easier assembly has been to provide blade brackets secured to the hub on the motor, with upstanding spaced projections over which corresponding aligned keyhole slots on the fan blades are placed. The blades are then outwardly moved to secure the projections in the narrower parts of the keyhole slots. Even when the fan blades are thus fixed in position, it is extremely difficult to avoid play on the blades, and vibration of the blades with respect to the blade brackets.
It is thus an object of the present invention to provide a construction of ceiling fan in which the blade bracket, blade and fan motor can all be largely assembled at the factory, and shipped out in a relatively small shipping volume per fan unit. It is a further object to provide such a construction which can be easily assembled by a customer and, when assembled, provide more rigid and stable construction and operation than these prior constructions.
In accordance with the present invention there is provided a blade bracket to releasably connect a blade of a ceiling fan to the rotor, the blade bracket comprising a mount adapted for attachment to the rotor and a blade support securable to the blade and releasably attachable to the mount. The mount comprises, at one end, means to permit securable attachment to the rotor. The blade support comprises, at one end, means for securing a fan blade thereto. At their other ends, the mount and blade support are provided with interlocking securing means releasably and securably to lock the mount and blade support together, with the fan blade in proper orientation, for operation of the fan.
In a preferred embodiment of the present invention, the mount comprises, at its other end, a sleeve having an entrance and a base, and the blade support comprises, at its other end, a neck which is releasably seatable into the mount sleeve through its entrance. A lock means is mechanically associated with the mount. This lock means is adjustable when the neck in seated in the sleeve to lock securely the neck in the sleeve, with the fan blade in proper orientation, for operation of the fan.
In yet another preferred embodiment of the present invention, the lock means comprises a carriage rotatably seated at the base of the sleeve to rotate between a receiving/locking position and a seating alignment position. The carriage is provided with a bearing surface and a slot in that bearing surface facing the base of the sleeve, and means to enable a person to move it between these two positions. A free end of the neck of the blade support has a protrusion with ears outwardly extending beyond sides of the neck to mateably fit into said slot in the carriage when the carriage is in the receiving/locking position and cause the neck to turn simultaneously as the carriage is then turned to seating alignment position. Slots are positioned in the sides of the sleeve, at its base, to mateably receive the locked ears when carried to seating alignment position by the carriage and the neck is then moved outwardly with respect to the sleeve. The bearing surface bears against the protrusion and securely locks the ears in the sleeve slots against dislodgment when the carriage is rotated back to receiving/locking position. The interior walls of the sleeve, is provided with opposed, ear-receiving slots along its length, these slots aligned with the slot in the bearing surface of the carriage when the carriage is in receiving/locking position so that the protrusion can be received in the bearing surface slot of the carriage when the neck is fully inserted in the sleeve.
The blade bracket, in accordance with the present invention, by permitting its blade support portion to be secured to the fan blade at the factory, avoids the time and inconvenience of customer assembly which has previously been a major problem with most types of ceiling fan constructions. Yet, by essentially splitting the blade bracket into two parts which can be assembled to provide a rigid and stable blade bracket unit, optimum savings in shipping volumes for ceiling fans having blade brackets of this construction can be realized.